'Dark Money' sheds light on campaign finance system

By Al Alexander/For the Patriot Ledger

Friday

Aug 3, 2018 at 3:27 AM

Despite what you’ve heard on the cable news channels, the greatest threat to our democracy isn’t Donald Trump or Russia, it’s a dangerously corrupt campaign finance system that has disturbingly shifted the power in politics from the people to pay-to-play corporations. That’s the gist of “Dark Money,” Kimberly Reed’s eye-opening documentary that uses her native Montana as a microcosm for the harm the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling has done to the way our country conducts political business.

It’s absolutely criminal how the likes of the Koch brothers and Sheldon Adelson are taking advantage by dumping unlimited amounts of cash to place their fat thumbs on scales of our supposedly free and unfettered election system. No longer is it a case of electing the candidate with the most votes; it’s a case of electing the candidate with the most untraceable campaign contributions. As one of Reed’s many talking heads notes, it’s flipped our democracy into an oligarchy, where our wealthiest citizens control everything our state legislatures, Congress and the White House do. And to no surprise, their main agenda is to establish laws that benefit only them, ultimately at our expense.

Take the recent tax cut -- please. And if you think immigrants and people of color are putting a strain on our system of entitlements, you’re wrong. The biggest freeloaders are the oil companies, all of which pay little or no taxes on the billions of dollars of earnings they hull in each year. In Montana, the evildoers are the strip-mine operations that have -- thanks to Citizens United -- bought and paid for relaxed environmental laws and reduced union labor. But fear not, the population in the Big Sky might be small but its willingness to fight back is strong.

Besides, Montana has been through this before. That was in the early part of the last century, when the state government was hijacked by powerful mining companies like Anaconda. And the scars they inflicted on the state’s majestic mountains stand today as a permanent reminder of the cost to the environment. In fact, at one former mine site, a massive open pit has gradually filled with water so acidic it packs the potency of the digestive fluid in your stomach. Just ask the flock of snow geese who mistakenly landed there recently. Oh, yea, you can’t. They all died from swimming in it.

It was because of such malfeasance that in 1912 the people fought back and helped initiate the nation’s strongest campaign finance laws in order to keep dirty money out of Montana’s politics. And it stood even in the wake of Citizens United, but the courts eventually struck it down, opening the floodgates on corruption via political action committees, aka PACs -- one of them started by anti-environmentalist and current secretary of the interior, Ryan Zinke, the Montanan best known for his $139,000 office doors -- that targeted Democrats as well as moderate Republicans for destruction in their fight to put forth an oligarchical agenda. They won control, of course. But fate had other ideas, and so did an unflappable investigative journalist in John S. Adams.

He's at the heart of Reed’s absorbing documentary, as he puts the screws to the system with help from Montana’s chief overseer of elections, Jonathan Motl, and a box of damning PAC records recovered -- get this! -- during a raid on a Colorado crack house. And Reed rightly frames it like a John Grisham novel. Just imagine a young Matt Damon as Adams and a distinguished Paul Newman type as Motl, and “Dark Money” could easily be a box-office darling. But what’s here is real, but no less enthralling, as Adams is fired by his paper for being too good a muckraker. But he doesn’t give up. He starts living out of his truck and establishes his own website, montanafreepress.org, and commences pouring through that treasure trove of confiscated PAC documents.

It’s thrilling to watch, and although I might be a mite prejudice, his tireless work made me proud to be a journalist -- exactly the same feeling I got watching the Oscar-winning “Spotlight,” a movie “Dark Money” shares a strong pedigree. I know, I hear you: “Documentaries are boring and bogged down in jargon and statistics.” True, there is some of that here, but Reed presents it so fascinatingly that you become as lost in the story as you would a great summer read.

The climax, natch, takes places in a packed, small-town courtroom with the entire future of not just a state, but the state of our democracy hanging in the balance. Don’t expect any big, blusterous speeches emanating from the movie’s unassuming hero, guest prosecutor Gene Jarussi. But he stands tall and mighty, garnering your full rooting interest. And don’t think this movie is a security blanket for bleeding-heart liberals. There are more than a few Republicans in a heavily GOP state of farmers and ranchers who play essential roles as well. Seeing the two parties work together is inspiring, not to mention a model for how things should work in deeply divided D.C.

If nothing else, “Dark Money” restores your faith in democracy, as the little, almost voiceless guys stand up to deep-pocketed muckety mucks to expose how the proliferation of PACs have nearly choked the life out of a government for the people, by the people. That alone makes “Dark Money” essential viewing for all. It may unfold in Montana, but what happened there is currently happening nationwide at nearly every level. And like those rank-and-file folks, Reed’s doc stands as a call for the rest of us to raise our voices and demanded that the rich and powerful give our country back.